Professor Jim Wilson becomes Fellow at The Royal Society of Edinburgh

The RSE (Royal Society of Edinburgh), Scotland’s national academy, has revealed its newly selected 2021 Fellows. This list includes our chief investigator, Professor Jim Flett Wilson

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    Professor Jim Wilson
    87 new Fellows revealed from across sciences, arts, education, business and public life
  • A number of the new Fellows have played a vital role during the pandemic

The RSE (Royal Society of Edinburgh), Scotland’s national academy, has revealed its newly selected 2021 Fellows. These new Fellows will join the RSE’s current roll of around 1,600 leading thinkers and practitioners from Scotland and beyond, whose work has a significant impact on our nation.

This year includes many new Fellows who have made a positive impact during the global Covid-19 pandemic: either as a result of their academic research or through their contribution to arts or for the role they have played in communicating complex information with the public. Those who are elected to the Fellowship have undergone a rigorous assessment of their achievements, professional standing and the contribution they and their work make to wider society.   

The list contains many leading academics including our Chief Investigator, Professor Jim Flett Wilson.  He set up all of our Viking Genes studies, including the Orkney Complex Disease Study, Viking Health Study Shetland and VIKING II. In the middle of last year he became a co-investigator of a research study called Coronagenes, looking into why some people get ill from Covid-19 whilst others do not.

It's a great honour to be elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh - from my point of view this also recognises the contributions from the people of Orkney and Shetland, who are at the heart of my studies. I look forward to continuing my work on the genetics of Scottish populations and contributing to the RSE public engagement programme, particularly in communicating genetics to the public."

Professor Jim Flett Wilson
Viking Genes, Chief Investigator, University of Edinburgh

He is joined by other leading academics including Professor Devi Sridhar, Chair of Global Public Health and Director of Global Health Governance Programme at Edinburgh University. Professor Sridhar, whose research considers the effectiveness of public health interventions, has become a household name in the last 12 months as a public health expert during the coronavirus pandemic.

Congratulations to all the fellows announced today and well done to Jim for his fellowship.